Disk error after 1st reboot in W7 re-install

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  1. Posts : 108
    W7 Home Prem, Vista home Prem
       #1

    Disk error after 1st reboot in W7 re-install


    Hi folks,

    History:
    Yesterday I installed W7 and all working ok. For resons I wont go into I decided that a re-install (as so little info was in the o/s) was easier than trying to solve admin/user issues.

    Setup before re-install:
    My HDD has 3 partitions and some unallocated space
    Partition 1 - System Reserved 300 Mb (NTFS, Primary, Active)
    Partition 2 - Windows 7 400 Gb (NTFS, Primary)
    Partition 3 - Vista Image from another HDD 150 Gb (NTFS, Primary)
    Unallocated space - approx 400 Gb

    Prior to beginning the renstall W7 was stable and happy. I could also dual boot happily into Vista on the other partition using the Win boot menu.

    Re-Instal Process:
    Went into Partition Wizard Boot CD and then wiped both the Sys Reserved partition and the Windows 7 partition (i wrote 0's to both)
    I then formated both of these partitions using PWBD
    Lastly I ensured that the Sys Res partition was Active (which it still was from last time)
    I then re-booted using the W7 install DVD
    It went through the instal process quite happily until the first re-boot is needed.

    At this point during the previous and sucessful installation on Sat, upon booting up it said 'press any key to boot ffrom DVD drive' so i left it and it then booted from the HDD and carried on with the W7 install for 5 more mins and was done.

    However this time, I got the same message about booting from the DVD and again I left it and nothing happened. After 5 mins I gave up and hit a key and it just said disk read error and hung on a back screen with flashing cursor.

    So I ejected the W7 DVD and rebooted and just got the same message.

    SO I rebooted with the W7 dvd in this time - and it began re-installing W7 again. It got about 5 mins into the instal process (was going a lot faster than normal cos most of the files were already there and uncompressed) and then gave the message of 'there are already windows files on the drive, it will copy them to a file called windows.old and carry on with the install'

    Becasue I want a clean install (and dont want a messed up install in there somewhere), whilst I wait for replies Ive been back into PWBD and am currently re-wiping the Sys Res drive and the W7 drive ahead of another attempt at installing

    I decided agaiunst this at the time and have just stopped and am writing this here to see what people think is the best way to proceed or if Im doing something obviously silly.

    Aside from the wipe Im doing, the method of installing W7 with a pre created Sys Res partition worked perfectly on Sat under Barefoot Kids guidance

    Thanks in advance for any thoughts
    Matt
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 22,814
    W 7 64-bit Ultimate
       #2

    Hello Matt.



    Do the wipes again, it's always best to have the best possible space to install Windows 7 to.


    If the Windows 7 install disk is one you burned yourself it may be a bad burn and needs to be done again, if so this would be the first thing to try.

    Use the free ISO burner at the link below to burn another at a speed of now more than 4x and select to let the program to verify the disk before it finishes.

    ImgBurn Free ISO Burner
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 108
    W7 Home Prem, Vista home Prem
    Thread Starter
       #3

    Hi barefoot,

    Wipes are in progress

    The w7 disc is original. It's a w7 full retail version home premium purchased fri. It's got the 32bit and 64bit versions on separate disks. Yesterday I installed the 64 bit and that's the one I wish to stick with

    The affore mentioned 'read error' was when trying to read the hdd not the odd. Also the hdd is brand new as of fri
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 22,814
    W 7 64-bit Ultimate
       #4

    Maybe it was a one-off error and it will go well this time, give it a go.



    Check all the HDD cable connections.
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 10,200
    MS Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-bit
       #5

    Icarus,

    Boot from the Win 7 DVD.
    At the very first dialog press SHIFT F10 key combo

    Go to a a command prompt.

    Run DiskPart's clean all command.


    WIPE A DISK CLEAN

    · type DiskPart, Enter key
    · type List disk, Enter key
    note the numeral of the disk you want to clean
    for example purposes, I’ll be using the numeral 2
    · type Select disk 2, Enter key
    · type Detail disk, Enter key
    this info will let you know if you selected correctly
    · type Clean ALL, Enter key
    your entire disk is being overwritten with zeros.
    This can take a considerable amount of time
    · type EXIT, Enter key (only after Clean is finished)
    · type EXIT, Enter key (this gets you back where you were)
      My Computer

  6.    #6

    Karl he wants to keep his Vista partition so can't Clean All.

    Are there flags showing on Vista partition now in PW, Matt?
    Last edited by gregrocker; 11 Oct 2010 at 03:51.
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 108
    W7 Home Prem, Vista home Prem
    Thread Starter
       #7

    Hi Greg,

    Wipes are finished now but am away from home pc because I'm at work now (it's 9am Monday for me')

    However when last looks at the end of the wipe last night the following info was there:

    Acitive / non-active flag. My system reserved partition is still active

    Ntfs - the sys res, win 7 and vista partitions are all labeled ntfs. The unallocated space is not

    However after the wipe with zeros the partitions that were sys res and win 7 don't have their labels anymore and are also showing up as unformatted

    I havent yet formatted them - that was going to be my next question: do I format then with PWBD or do I launch straight into win7 install

    Only problem with the latter is that if I do, neither partition will have a label during install and I'll have to guess where to install w7 based on the size of the partition alone

    Matt
      My Computer


  8. Posts : 22,814
    W 7 64-bit Ultimate
       #8

    You don't need to do anything else in PW; when you get here you can easily tell the partitions apart, you can also format them here also at "Drive Options (advanced)" do it this way.


    click to enlarge
    Disk error after 1st reboot in W7 re-install-22222.jpg
      My Computer

  9.    #9

    I was asking you earlier if any flags changed on the Vista partition. There should be none.

    Partition using PW CD since you need to mark System Reserved Active again.

    If the install fails again then I would boot back in, delete the SysReserved and WIn7 partitions, then create one partition in that space to try installing to.

    Do you have any Win7 backup images?
      My Computer


  10. Posts : 108
    W7 Home Prem, Vista home Prem
    Thread Starter
       #10

    Barefoot kid: ok - thanks. I will give it another shot at a re- install without formatting either the sysres or w7 partitions from PWBD. I will use w7 installer to format. I presume that this process will all me' to re-label the two currently unlabelled partitions?

    Greg: hi. To be clear:
    The vista partition did not have an active flag before w7 was reinstalled, nor during or after the partition wipes of the w7 and sysres partitions. The active flag (according to pwbd) has always remained with the sys res partition. I've never had to set or under this since the original installation of w7

    Additionally, the wiping of the sysres and w7 partitions did not require me' to unmake or remake any partitions. I just scheduled a wipe of both the sysres and w7 partitions (as labeled) from within pwbd. After the wipe the partitions are still there, just unlabeled and unformatted. Their sizes are as before

    I'm trying not to be confusing- sorry.
    Because the partitions are still there, even after the wipe, the partition that was labeled sysres (but now has no label) is still marked as active

    Hope that explains?

    If this re-install fails tonight, then I will delete the sysres and windows 7 partitions and create a single, wiped w7 partition and try an install into that and see how it goes

    Thanks
    Matt
      My Computer


 
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